I just finished Big Bang; The Origin of the Universe by Simon Singh. As with Singh’s books on crypto and Fermat’s Last Theorem this is just about as good as science writing for a general audience gets. Singh is British and assumes that an intelligent reader can handle a fair amount of real physics (he himself has a Ph.D. in physics) and does not try to spice things up with an excessive focus on the personalities of the scientists (most of whom don’t actually have much personality, of course, or none that would be recognized by Paris Hilton).
One of the interesting tidbits in the book for me was about Ralph Alpher, who provided the mathematical and theoretical basis for the Big Bang theory, notably for the formation of hydrogen and helium out of a soup of protons, neutrons, and electrons.
“Alpher’s academic career had started promisingly in 1937, when, as a sixteen-year-old prodigy, he received a scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Unfortunately, while chatting to one of the institute’s alumni, he casually mentioned that his family was Jewish — and the scholarship was promptly withdrawn. … The only way that Alpher could get back on the academic track was by holding down a day job and attending evening classes at George Washington University, where he eventually completed his bachelor’s degree.”
Back in 1978 I was holding down a day job (Fortran programming for some scientists; a job that is probably still available today!) and attending G.W.U. at night. Then in 1979 I transferred to M.I.T., precisely the reverse of Alpher’s path.
[Due to a lack of good experimental data, e.g., an observation of the cosmic microwave background radiation predicted by Alpher and his collaborators Gamow and Herman, their Big Bang theory was ignored and all three guys abandoned cosmology. Alpher went to work at G.E. and Herman went to work at G.M. Gamow was a tenured professor at G.W.U. and drifted into seemingly more promising areas.]
Another fun part of the book is the recounting of Pope Pius XII’s 1951 endorsement of the Big Bang theory against the Steady State model, many decades ahead of the average physicist.
I finished the book at the Beluga Lake Lodge in Homer, Alaska while Jewel’s brother Nikos was setting up to play some of his songs. The weather here seems to be reliably sunny and 65-70 degrees. Almost everyone in Homer has a beautiful view to the south across Kachemak Bay and to a range of mountains that climb to about 7000′ high and are dotted with snow and glaciers.
Agree wholeheartedly about Singh’s writings, I have read all of his books and I wish he would write more. Maybe next he can tackle Fermi’s Paradox and summarize (as he so eloquently does) the history and current best thinking.
Brian Greene is another great writer for the general audience.
I agree about the readability of Singh and enjoyed reading Fermat’s Last Theorem; however, I must argue that Richard Feynman had a tremendous personality and may be a better author for the general public. Perhaps Feynman has not written on the variety of subjects as Singh, but his writings and taped lectures are extrememly understandable and interesting. QED, Six Easy and Not so Easy pieces are just a few examples of this. Furthermore, Feynman has written less intelectual books such as Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman. You have enticed me to pick up Big Bang; The Origin of the Universe and I will let you know how it compares.
Thanks for reminding me of Homer! I was there just over four years ago to visit my great-uncle, Leo Rhode, who lived there most of his life and was at one time the mayor. Check out my Alaska Photolog including a flightseeing tour around Kachemak Bay and the lower Kenai Pennisula aboard a classic 1929 S-6000B Travel Air.
Did you skip high school ?
Paul: How is Brian Greene’s latest book? I had a tough time getting through Elegant Universe. Brad: Feynman is great but I’ve always loved astrophysics more than other branches so Big Bang gets a boost from its subject. Stella: I did skip out on high school. G.W.U. wasn’t the best college in America but it was better than high school in ever way. At the time that I attended (1978) the Shah of Iran was still in power and the college was full of young wealthy Iranians. Hard to imagine that in our lifetimes the Iranians have gone from being valued customers to evil evildoers.
Unfortunately, Feynman is also dead. I don’t think he’ll be writing any more popular science books, unless someone comes up with a Feynman emulator computer algorithm.
Hi Philip, to be honest I have only paged through Greene’s latest at Barnes and Noble the other day and I had it my cart 2 times to buy and I put it back on the shelf; primarily for 2 reasons (am in the middle of a few other books, and I saw a lot of String Theory in Greene’s new book and I struggle with that).
Am curious why you had a tough time with his first book.. writing style, topics, etc?
Have fun in Jackson!
I don’t recall Phil’s dropping references to the fact that he attended GW quite as often as I read about his attendance at MIT. I wonder why that is? LOL
Paul: I just didn’t feel that I was learning anything from Greene’s book. I generally find that science writing has either too much or too little math. If there is too little math I read the words but I can’t tell you what I’ve learned.
Michael: Why not too many mentions of GWU? Let’s see… it might have something to do with the fact that I attended GW in 1978 at the age of 14. Do you have a lot of occasions to tell folks about stuff that you were doing at age 14 and/or in 1978? MIT is a little fresher in my (41-year-old) mind, given that the last courses I took at MIT were in 2003 (geology, biology). But whenever kids ask me for advice about undergraduate colleges I always mention that I attended both GWU and MIT and that GWU had its advantages, e.g., a lot more contact with and special treatment from faculty.
Thanks, Philip. I learned a lot from Greene’s book, sounds like I started farther down the knowledge hierarchy than you :-). Interesting comment/thought about general science writing, I need to ponder. I was a math major many moons ago, but somehow can’t stand equations anymore for the most part (btw, based on your comments, don’t waste your time with Greene’s latest, looking through it, I saw very little math). So… I assume you did NOT like Bill Bryson’s “A Short History of Nearly Everything”? I think you would like Peter Ward’s “Rare Earth”.
-paul
Am reading singh’s book and greatly enjoy it. The story about Alpher’s scholarship was interesting to me as my kid attended MIT.However,the story doesnt quite ring true for a couple of reasons. In the 1930s people in a place like Boston would have been hyper-aware of ethnicity (as they are even today).It seems nearly impossible that they wouldnt haved guessed he was Jewish when they offered him the scholarship. Also, the scholarship was contingent on him attending as a full time live-in student, which he could not afford to do. That in itself would have caused him to be denied.In addition, Feynman attended MIT at exactly the same time,living in a Jewish fraternity, and earning prizes in physics.His auto-biography doesnt report any particularly rigorous anti-semitism at the place. Of course we have to accept that anti-semitism was an undercurrent there,as in very other venue in America at the time. Its been said that Chomsky was forced to take a spot at MIT vs. Harvard due to bias.